Into the Foray
by JadeLightning-Wolf
Summary: Several drabbles focusing on various characters throughout the series.


Song Challenge Drabble Meme

**Into the Foray**

Song Challenge Drabble Meme

Fandom: Rurouni Kenshin

Authoress: Jade Lightning-Wolf

Rating: T for language and some adult themes and violence

Rules of the Challenge: Put your music player on "All Music" and turn the control to random. Write drabbles inspired by the first ten songs that come up. You have only the time that each song plays to finish the drabble. (Editing after writing is, of course, permitted.) You may write in any fandom with any characters of your choice.

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**1. May it Be written by Howard Shore performed by Enya 4:18**

Hitokiri Battousai. Few have had the pleasure…perhaps that is not the proper word… Suffice it to say that I am one of the few to have known him personally during the darkest days of the Bakumatsu, before Tomoe had shown him light again.

His path was shrouded in darkness and I feared for the boy's soul. So much blood on his hands before he'd even turned of age. I remember the day when he looked up at me as if in a daze.

"I must be fifteen now," he murmured.

I started. "Congratulations! We must take you out to celebrate. Sake on me?"

"No," he replied, so quickly I had barely turned in the direction of the bar. "I have an assignment tonight."

I looked into his eyes, dark and silvery at the same time.

_I hope you find your light boy. You're alone as you are now, and that cannot possibly bode well for your soul. We need you too badly for you to lose your light. You are our hope._

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**2. Ready, Steady, Go! by L'Arc en Ciel 3:48**

This is it. This is the moment. I'm finally going to become a worthy swordsman. Six years under Kaoru. Six miserable years of putting up with her awful cooking. Six years of unbearable training schedules. Six years of training, of watching them go into battle without me, of working so hard on that damned ougi, of watching Kenshin limp back time after time until Megumi forbid him from every doing it again. Moving into Sano's flat. Going to their marriage. Seeing Kenji born. From the very beginning I've been rushing towards this moment and now that it's here…ok, so I'm a little sad about passing on to a different life, but still. I'm ready! This is my time. What about you Kenshin? Are you ready? Because here I come!

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**3. Mama by My Chemical Romance 4:39**

"Shishio! Shishio-sama! Where are you?"

"Here, Yumi. Are you blind?"

"Shishio-sama?"

"Come wench, don't you know hell when you see it?"

"Hell…then we…then he…"

"Yes. Damn him and his idealism. Don't worry I'm sure he'll turn up in thirty years or so and then we'll see who the true victor is."

Some ugly crunches under her feet in the dark. Sparks fly in the distances as a sword runs across his gauntlet, igniting it. Flames leap before a face emaciated and black as the thick miasma surrounding them.

"Shi…Shishio-sama?"

"Welcome, lover."

The figure advances forward.

"No…no," she whispers, tripping over the bony remains at her feet.

"This can't be right."

"Aren't you happy to be here with me Yumi?"

Flesh drips from his bones as the flames leap higher around him.

"Aren't you happy?"

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**4. White and Nerdy by Weird Al Yankovic 2:49**

"Kenshin? Hey, Kenshin. Can I ask a question?"

"Certainly, Yahiko."

"Why do you insist on wearing that girly pink gi? Don't you know you look like a complete idiot?"

"Oro…" Kenshin began scrubbing harder at the laundry, attempting to hide his flushed face in the suds.

"Come on. Sometimes people mistake you for a girl on the street. I mean you're so pale…really white, you know? And your long hair. I mean, I'm surprised people don't hit on you thinking your some gaijin prostitute."

"Oooooroooo…Yahiko, who taught you what a prostitute is?"

"Lived with yakuza remember?"

At that moment Sano strolled into the yard, decked out in a hideous purple gi, complete with gold trim.

"Ok," Yahiko amended. "Kenshin, you may look like a girl, but Sano…Sano you just look like a dork."

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**5. Swords Crossed by Hans Zimmer 3:16**

"Do you never tire of this?"

"Tire of what?"

"Your life style. You are doomed to forever cross swords with idiot upstarts who think they can overthrow the government. You've been doing it since the days of the Bakumatsu and you'll be doing it until you're too old to lift a sword."

"So long as there is evil the world, I will be there to destroy it. Not to mention I wish to prevent a second Bakumatsu from every happening."

"You, Fujita-san, are a very strange man."

The man in question took a drag on his cigarette before giving a wolfish smile.

"You've never met the Hitokiri Battousai have you?"

"If he's anything like you, I don't think I want to."

"Oh, I'm much worse than he is. He's just stranger."

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**6. I'm So Sick by Flyleaf 2:57**

That's right. All of you feel my blade. Feel the joy of steel cutting through your muscles, your organs, your bones. The grate of metal against metal is delicious in my ears. You're all too weak. Disappointing. Are these the best swordsman this weak era can produce? It's no fun anymore. Die! The lot of you. Feel my cold gaze cross over you and tremble in your bones. Your fear will be the last feeling you know. Oh ho, someone's a little more frightened than the rest. Wet yourself did you? Wait…what's that? One of them is moving. I'll take great pleasure carving you up. You, one who is bold enough to play with me, to stand against me. Feel my blade in your skin. Your blood is beautiful.

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**7. The Circle of Life performed by Carmen Twillie written by John Elton and Tim Rice 3:59**

"Dad?"

"Yes, Kenji."

"Why…why do things die?"

Startled from the washing by such a serious question, Kenshin turned to his four-year-old son. A dead starling was cradled in the boy's hands.

"Oh, Kenji…" Kenshin murmured as he gently took up the starling. "I…well…let's get this fellow buried properly and I'll try and explain as best as I can."

Kenshin rose from the basin and took his sons hand. "I know it's hard for you to imagine Kenji, but death has to happen to keep the world healthy. Can you imagine what the world would be like if no one ever died? How many people would be here and how much pain so many of them would be in? Think about Gensai-sensei in his passing hour. Do you remember?"

The little boy nodded, remembering how the doctor had been murmuring half delirious with pain and calling for his wife.

"If Gensai-sensei hadn't been able to die, he would still be in that pain now. And after sixty years on this planet, sometimes people start to long for death. Sometimes they just get tired of the word.

"…Do you understand?"

The boy looked up before shaking his head. "Not really."

Kenshin thought for a moment, but then smiled gently. "That's alright, Kenji. I'd rather you didn't have to understand this just yet."

_After all_, Kenshin thought to himself, _sometimes people have to die for significantly less glorified reasons…_

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**8. Broken Home by Papa Roach 3:40**

Nee-san. Nee-san. Why did you leave? Do you know what it's done to father? He…he's not like he used to be. Sometimes I think he forgets I'm in the house. Other times he's so angry…so angry. I tried to hide the sake the other day. He's angrier when he has that. He found out. Tonight, I can't sleep on my back, it hurts so badly. Nee-san? Why did he have to die? If he was still here, then you would still be here, and maybe father wouldn't be like this? I think…I think you made him happier…made him think of Okaa-san. Nee-san…tonight I packed a travel parcel. I'm going to find you. I'm going to help you get revenge so you can come home and things can be better again. I'm so alone. Please, Nee-san. Come home. It's cold now. Come home. It's so cold without you.

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**9. She Hates Me by Puddle of Mudd 3:36**

"That's it Sanosuke Sagara! Get out my clinic this instant!"

"But Megumi…"

"No 'but's.' I told you to leave so get out before I call the police."

"Ah, Megumi, you wouldn't really."

"Watch me, Sano," she said, turning on him with flushed cheeks and a ticking eyebrow. "I don't know where you get off thinking you can just disappear for years on end and then show up expecting me to treat your wounds for free."

"Meg, I'm dripping on your tatami."

"Well if you'd leave, you'd be dripping your God-damned blood elsewhere."

"But…"

"Sano! I got married!"

"You…"

"You heard me. Now leave."

Sano stumbled out the door in a daze.

_My god…I never thought…maybe…maybe she really did hate me for all those years and wasn't just teasing…_

"Sano!" He turned at her call, too attuned to her voice to do anything else.

"I'm lying you idiot. Do you really think I'd abandon all hope so easily?"

He grinned at her slightly, still somewhat offput. _Yep…she hates me alright._

* * *

**10. I'm Still Here by John Rzeznik 4:11**

I've always been a bit of an outcast. A woman in a male-dominated society trying to run a dojo in what's considered a man's art, and not only that, but living at my age with out a husband yet with three men constantly invading my privacy. I'm sure I've been the neighborhood's gossip whore since I was fifteen. It's hard sometimes, being shunned by the women around me because they believe I'm selling my body for money. Is it so wrong to be different? To want to uphold my father's art? To want to be independent? I know the boys don't see me that way, but still… Sometimes I wonder if they see me as a woman at all. It seems like everyone wants me to be something I'm not…a whore, a cook, a wife, a mother. I'm not ready for those things yet. And then…sometimes he looks at me, that look he saves just for me when we're alone and everyone's gone home for the night. That look that says, _To me, you are perfect and beautiful and nothing about you needs to be changed. You are a wonderful woman just as you are_. And at those times…being the neighborhood's whore isn't so bad.

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_A/N: I know. You thought I was dead and rotting in a grave right? It's worse than that. It's college. Ok, I lie. I love college and I especially love living on my own this summer, but I am so drained and to top things off I may be developing some sort of heart condition. I can't begin to beg forgiveness, but please be aware that I haven't forgotten you all. I know this isn't "Shards of Me" but the fact of the matter is that it's _something. _I'm glad I was even able to manage this much. I planning on doing these memes in several fandoms in hopes of getting my writing skills repolished and switched over from writing term papers to writing something that has enjoyable material in it. If you'd like to hear from me a little more regularly (or harass me a little more to keep things moving, because believe me, your comments actually do motivate me) the link to my livejournal is in my author's page. And now, for your joyous crack of the day: Picture Kenshin rolling along on a Segue while Sano watches in complete pimp attire. Beautiful image isn't it?_


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